Sands Point's Harbor Road Gets A Name Change

For the past four months, changing the name of Harbor Road in Sands Point has been on the village board's docket. At this week's Village of Sands Point Board of Trustees meeting a decision was finally made to officially change the road's name to "Harbor Acres Road," invoking the name of the housing development in which it lies.

"I recommend we change the name of the street," Mayor Leonard Wurzel said. "Most people were in favor of the change. Now, we have to do whatever we have to do with the post office, the IRS and such. We'll take care of whatever has to be done."

This came following a public hearing at the village's February board meeting where more than 20 Sands Point residents and Port Washington business owners came to voice their opinions on the matter. The mayor said there was also a petition signed by more than 50 people pertaining to the matter.

Harbor Road resident and street name change advocate Debbie Kramer was in attendance for the ruling on the subject and said she was "very pleased" with the board's decision. She said she can't wait to tell her family and friends of the victory.

"I'm excited, very excited," Kramer said. "I'm very happy that they decided to change the street name. I don't think it will be a huge change at all. Hopefully, it will relieve a lot of that confusion. I think it makes it easier since everyone knows exactly where we are instead of saying this Harbor Road or that Harbor Road."

Sands Point trustee Marc Silbert, who serves as the village's building commissioner, said the village must now remove all street signs that say Harbor Road, notify all Sands Point residents and surrounding businesses and alert the proper authorities (IRS, police department, fire department, etc.) of the the change. He said there are nine street signs in total that have to be replaced.

Oddly enough, Mother Nature played already helped with the removal of the street signs. Two of the nine signs were blown down in the recent rainstorm that pummeled Long Island.

"So I guess we're off to a good start with two signs down," Silbert said. "I think it's about a six-week production and I figure about another week to two weeks for the crew to get the new signs up and mounted. So figure, in about two months, it'll all be done. It shouldn't be that big a change being that so many residents supported it."